The Order of Wedding Speeches – Wedding Toasts Order

The Order of Wedding Speeches

Traditionally, there’s a order of wedding speeches that must be followed at the wedding ceremony. You’re probably asking yourself why should you care about the wedding toasts order. You know that you’re first and that’s enough. Well, it’s not like that. It’s good to know also who’s following so you can maybe refer to them in your speech.

Wedding Speech Order

The first one to give the speech is, in most traditions, the father of bride. Usually, he’s the one paying for the wedding, hence, being the host, will have the opening toast. This is the reason for which this is considered one of the most important wedding speeches. You should start your toast by welcoming everyone at the wedding and then say a few words about your daughter (click here for 25 professional speech examples). Make sure you compliment her, this is the most important day from her life and she will probably remember this day for the rest of her life. You can also share a few moments from when she was a kid and probably one or two funny stories, but make sure they aren’t embarrassing for her. Then you welcome the groom and his parents in our family and say a few nice things about the groom. Don’t say too much, because that’s the job of the best man, which will have the last speech. End your speech by giving thanks to all the people involved with the wedding planning (here are some more speech examples for you).

To follow the traditional wedding speech order, the next toast is held by the father of the groom. He will thank you for the opening toast and for all the nice things you said about the newlyweds and especially his son. Then he should also thank to the guests for coming to the wedding and then he will say a few things about his son. Again, there will be some childhood memories and probably a few funny stories, but his speech shouldn’t be too long, usually shorter than the bride’s father’s.

The next one is the groom who will start his speech by giving thanks to his father for the nice things (hopefully) he said about him previously. Then will thank to the bride’s parents for raising such a wonderful girl and for taking care about the wedding. Then he will say also a few nice things about his wife, maybe how they met and thanking the bridesmaids and the groomsmen for all the help.

The last and the probably the most memorable one is the best man speech. Everyone expects this to the the funniest speech at the wedding ceremony. The best man should focus mainly on sharing stories about the groom and the bride and make some funny jokes, but again, not crossing the limit. Then he closes by wishing a great honeymoon and a happy marriage for the newlyweds.

This is the wedding speech order at most traditional weddings. In some cultures or countries, there are other speeches like for the bride, mother of the bride and bridesmaids, but these are optional.